Not Cookbooks, but…

Clara Sturak
Associate editor

Madame Wu’s Garden
Sylvia Wu

Susie Coelho’s Everyday Styling
Susie Coelho

   In my role as food columnist, I receive lots of cookbooks, some that stretch the very definition of cookbook to the limit. In the past few weeks I’ve been sent two books that fit into that category – in very different ways. Both have serious limitations as cookbooks, but both are successful on their own terms.
   Longtime Santa Monica restaurateur and local legend Madame Wu closed her Wilshire Boulevard restaurant in 1998, after 37 years of serving her Chinese Chicken Salad to the famous and not-so-famous in darkened rooms filled with cozy booths and Chinese family heirlooms.
   Since closing the red lacquered double doors of her establishment, Sylvia Wu has put together a personal memoir of the place, “Madame Wu’s Garden: A Pictorial History of a Celebrated Landmark.” The book is more a public scrapbook than anything – it’s filled with photos of Wu with her arm around (good friend) Cary Grant, Elizabeth Taylor, Hugh Grant and just about anyone who has ever been “anyone” in the last four decades.
   In one of the final times Madame Wu’s Garden made the papers, Tom Cruise famously sprinted from the parking lot after dining there, when he saw a woman get hit by a car. Wu reprints a “USA Today” article that looks almost as if it should be pasted in: “Tom Cruise’s Latest Role is Guardian Angel.”
   Scattered throughout the book are recipes for some of Madame Wu’s specialties – they seemingly made the cut because they were the “favorites” of the various celebrities who frequented the place. Pat O’Brien favored fried rice, Carol Burnett’s kids liked shrimp toast, and Governor Pete Wilson ate ginger ice cream at his 60th birthday party.
   But my favorite chapter of Madame Wu’s Garden is entitled “Asian Friends.” I like it because it’s a chance to see photos of smiling faces that are very important in other parts of the world – the mayor of Shanghai, the Prince and Princess of Malaysia, Madame Chaing Kai-Shek — but whom I wouldn’t recognize if my life depended on it. It also shows that Wu cut a wide swath – her life, I think, has not been as star-struck as her book might make it seem.
   Meanwhile, for those of you who miss one of Santa Monica’s favorite “special occasion” restaurants, where you really could be sure to spot a famous face across the room – this is a fun book to browse through. And, there are even a few recipes worth trying.
   While “Madame Wu’s Garden” is a self-published book with an almost homemade appeal, “Susie Coelho’s Everyday Styling,” published by Simon & Schuster, is just the opposite. The glossy “lifestyle” book is, frankly, just the kind of thing I usually hate – a shiny, colorful 208 pages of proof that I suck at my own life. But, I have to admit, the former Mrs. Sonny Bono and host of Home and Garden Television’s “Surprise Gardener,” has a lighter touch than style mavens in the Martha Stewart mode. She’s big on saving time and money, and seems to think that almost everything you need to “style” your home into a showplace can be found in your attic or garage.
   Still, I’m just not the kind of person who is ever going to create a “style file binder” to “develop my vision,” of how I want my bathroom or kitchen to look. It’s just not going to happen.
   All that aside, it’s pretty to look at, and to get back to the subject of this column, it has a few good, basic recipes that really would be helpful additions to most cooks’ repertoires. Coelho says her French Herb Chicken is perfect for a buffet, and I’d have to agree with that. Her Blueberry Cream Cheese Breakfast-in-Bed Muffins make for a tasty and stylish morning meal, and – just for a change – she includes a recipe for putting on your face instead of in it – Fresh Avocado Facial Mask. Even the most style-less know it’s fun to play with your food, and if all else fails, you can scout out some tortilla chips and have a snack.

   Chinese Mixed Green Vegetables (from “Madame Wu’s Garden”)
   Leslie Nielsen’s Favorite!
   Serves 4

   2 Tablespoons oil
   1 thinly sliced ginger root
   1 clove garlic crushed
   2 cups chopped Chinese cabbage
   1 teaspoon salt, or to taste
   1/2 teaspoon sugar
   1/4 chicken broth
   1/2 cup pea pods
   1/2 cup sliced bamboo shoots
   1/2 thinly sliced mushrooms

   Heat wok until hot. Swirl oil to coat bottom and sides of wok. Rub ginger root and garlic in wok using a long-handled fork, and discard. Add cabbage and stir. Add salt, sugar and broth. Stir and cover. Cook 3 minutes. Add pea pods, bamboo shoots, and mushrooms. Stir-fry 30 seconds. Serve hot.

   French Herb Chicken (from “Susie Coelho’s Everyday Styling”)
   Serves 4

   3-5 pound roasting chicken
   1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste
   2 garlic cloves, minced (optional)
   Herbs de Provence (can be found at the grocery store, or use a mixture of fresh or dried rosemary, sage and thyme)
   1/2 cup butter (1 stick)

   Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Place the chicken in a roasting pan, breast side up, and rub all over with the salt. If you love garlic, rub the minced garlic into the skin. Sprinkle the chicken with the herbs. Cut the butter into pats and place them inside the cavity, tucked around the legs and wings, and on top of the breast (you can slip them under the skin if you’d like). Place the chicken in the oven and bake for 30 minutes.
   Turn the oven down to 375 degrees and continue cooking for another hour or so, depending on the size of the chicken, basting occasionally with the juices that accumulate in the pan. The chicken is done when the juices run clear and the skin is very crisp.